sellers of cat S cars always telling this BS
Discussion
So as we know cat S car means structural damage yes it can be small rear quarter damage little bit roof etc etc but fact is fact it was not only bumper damage lol it's mostly more serious as cat N. This seller is very funny he quote official description of cat S and then keep bragging that it was no chassis damage.
Every single seller will tell you this. Nobody will tell you car chassis was bent and airbags deployed etc.
Im just thinking do everyone still believe this crap???? Seriously...
then there are some sellers giving picture like before repair and I bet 99% will believe it ...
BUT he can repair car in half way and then make these pictures....
even worse someone can put half repaired car in auction it's impossible to know.
here is quote from ebay
This car was a category type S insurance write off. For those that are not aware of exactly what this means please read the following.
"New insurance write-off categories were introduced in October 2017, with Cat N and Cat S classifications replacing the old Cat C and Cat D groupings. A Cat S car is one which has sustained structural damage during a crash – think items such as chassis and suspension. While the car can safely be repaired and put back on the road, Cat S cars must be re-registered with the DVLA before being put back on the road."
Below is a list of the work that was carried out to repair this car.
The damage was sustained to the drivers front corner. There was no damage to the suspension or chassis and no jig straightening work was required.
Every single seller will tell you this. Nobody will tell you car chassis was bent and airbags deployed etc.
Im just thinking do everyone still believe this crap???? Seriously...
then there are some sellers giving picture like before repair and I bet 99% will believe it ...
BUT he can repair car in half way and then make these pictures....
even worse someone can put half repaired car in auction it's impossible to know.
here is quote from ebay
This car was a category type S insurance write off. For those that are not aware of exactly what this means please read the following.
"New insurance write-off categories were introduced in October 2017, with Cat N and Cat S classifications replacing the old Cat C and Cat D groupings. A Cat S car is one which has sustained structural damage during a crash – think items such as chassis and suspension. While the car can safely be repaired and put back on the road, Cat S cars must be re-registered with the DVLA before being put back on the road."
Below is a list of the work that was carried out to repair this car.
The damage was sustained to the drivers front corner. There was no damage to the suspension or chassis and no jig straightening work was required.
As I have said in previous communications on PH involving CAT A, B, C, D, S, or N insurance write offs, you are playing with fire in purchasing any of these dodgy vehicles.
Of course - if you intend to keep it for 4, or 5 years+, it doesn't really matter what's happened to it. BUT, there is always a very big fat chance that you've bought something that turns out to have been badly repaired and has not had the "little knock" that the seller claims it has.....
The internet is plastered with idiots trying to sell these "hooky" cars at the same price, or near to, a "straight" car - claiming that it was repaired professionally - whatever that means. It will ALWAYS have the stigma attached of a very dodgy history. It might drive perfectly, but some time down the line, its dubious history may well surface.
Of course - if you intend to keep it for 4, or 5 years+, it doesn't really matter what's happened to it. BUT, there is always a very big fat chance that you've bought something that turns out to have been badly repaired and has not had the "little knock" that the seller claims it has.....
The internet is plastered with idiots trying to sell these "hooky" cars at the same price, or near to, a "straight" car - claiming that it was repaired professionally - whatever that means. It will ALWAYS have the stigma attached of a very dodgy history. It might drive perfectly, but some time down the line, its dubious history may well surface.
Having recently had a car written off, following a non-fault accident, classification seems pretty arbitrary at best.
The first assessor classified it as a cat N, following the damage report from the repair garage. I went back to the the insurers, in order to get more money, as the initial valuation was low and a second assessor reclassified it as cat S on the basis on the photos, from the original report, without ever seeing the car.
The car drove fine, but I imagine that until any repairs were actually under way, it would be impossible to tell if it had any structural damage or not.
The first assessor classified it as a cat N, following the damage report from the repair garage. I went back to the the insurers, in order to get more money, as the initial valuation was low and a second assessor reclassified it as cat S on the basis on the photos, from the original report, without ever seeing the car.
The car drove fine, but I imagine that until any repairs were actually under way, it would be impossible to tell if it had any structural damage or not.
Insurers these days seem to just classify anything old as Cat S or N because they don't bother sending anyone to look at them.
My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
Mr Tidy said:
Insurers these days seem to just classify anything old as Cat S or N because they don't bother sending anyone to look at them.
My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
Sometimes the categories are purely decided on value - they added up the 3 or 4 panels, wheel, bumper etc and it was > 200% of the car's worth and that's where it came fromMy nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
Mr Tidy said:
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
Cat N used to be >50%, easy enough with a hire car for a week at silly rates.Mr Tidy said:
Insurers these days seem to just classify anything old as Cat S or N because they don't bother sending anyone to look at them.
My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
To an extent, it still goes on value of repairs. So your bumper marks, trivial yes but how much is a new bumper, then paint, then hire car costs plus if parts aren't available... and if all that starts to get very spendy and the car isn't worth it, sometimes easier / cheaper to total loss and move on.My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
Cat S is when there's any damage to the frame... the red car, maybe it was assumed there was intrusion into the base of the A pillar or inner arch and again, maybe at that age it's better to err on the side of caution.
There's always blokes on forums spitting feathers as their 21 year old Mondeo was total loss but all it needed was two months trawling for pre-rusted second hand mismatched panels, some tile grout and a DIY respray in Barrys shed using Early Learning Centre paints. Then cue outrage that the insurers wrote it off when it was "repaired" for £30...
Recently had a car declared cat S write off for light but extensive damage all down one side.
I had a good look underneath on a ramp and drove it for 300 miles after the accident. I am confident there was no structural damage, not was the nature of the impact likely to have caused structural damage.
The car was 10yrs old however. Assessor basically admitted that they declare most older cars that are merely uneconomic to repair (with full new panels etc) as cat S, as it saves the cost and hassle of actually having to find out whether anything serious is actually bent.
So likely lots of vehicles that could be repaired by more sensible means being scrapped as Cat S as a result.
I had a good look underneath on a ramp and drove it for 300 miles after the accident. I am confident there was no structural damage, not was the nature of the impact likely to have caused structural damage.
The car was 10yrs old however. Assessor basically admitted that they declare most older cars that are merely uneconomic to repair (with full new panels etc) as cat S, as it saves the cost and hassle of actually having to find out whether anything serious is actually bent.
So likely lots of vehicles that could be repaired by more sensible means being scrapped as Cat S as a result.
Mr Tidy said:
There's always blokes on forums spitting feathers as their 21 year old Mondeo was total loss but all it needed was two months trawling for pre-rusted second hand mismatched panels, some tile grout and a DIY respray in Barrys shed using Early Learning Centre paints. Then cue outrage that the insurers wrote it off when it was "repaired" for £30...
Basically any level of damage on a 10+ year old car must be enough to write it off on finance grounds if the credit hire etc is included in the calculation.I've seen CatD old cars before that genuinely had suffered extremely minor damage e.g light keying all up one side or door dents that were just slightly larger than the dent man could get out. A quote to paint & match a metallic colour down the side of a car could easily be £2k+
Edited by DaveCWK on Friday 6th September 08:19
My brother leant a tough lesson buying a repaired cat car several years ago.
On the eBay add it was described as “no airbags changed”
Which he (perhaps naively) thought meant “no air bags deployed therefore needed changing”.
What it meant was - several airbags had deployed in the accident, but the seller never bothered changing them.
On the eBay add it was described as “no airbags changed”
Which he (perhaps naively) thought meant “no air bags deployed therefore needed changing”.
What it meant was - several airbags had deployed in the accident, but the seller never bothered changing them.
Mr Tidy said:
Insurers these days seem to just classify anything old as Cat S or N because they don't bother sending anyone to look at them.
You would be crying at the additional cost if they did. Instead of crying relentlessly about your s
tbox being a cat N. Edited by Dingu on Friday 6th September 08:39
I wouldnt be averse to buying a categorized car, if I could see pictures of how it looked before it was repaired, most are like those xamples above these days rather than the eighties cut and shut jobs, seeing various YouTube videos of repairs makes me less concerned, the main reason I dont is they arent cheap enough to bother in a lot of cases.
The car may well have only had a wing and a bonnet, and in a lot of cases is no different to one damaged earlier in life and not recorded, makes no odds but the stigma down the line when you try to sell it means they needs be a lot lot cheaper than a non cat car, and mostly they arent.
The car may well have only had a wing and a bonnet, and in a lot of cases is no different to one damaged earlier in life and not recorded, makes no odds but the stigma down the line when you try to sell it means they needs be a lot lot cheaper than a non cat car, and mostly they arent.
Davie said:
Mr Tidy said:
Insurers these days seem to just classify anything old as Cat S or N because they don't bother sending anyone to look at them.
My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
To an extent, it still goes on value of repairs. So your bumper marks, trivial yes but how much is a new bumper, then paint, then hire car costs plus if parts aren't available... and if all that starts to get very spendy and the car isn't worth it, sometimes easier / cheaper to total loss and move on.My nephews 2004 E46 was a Cat S in 2018 based on photos from his phone.
After a bonnet from Ebay and a new wing it was fine - never a Cat S.
My 2005 330i became a Cat N last year because the insurer of the other driver accepted the inflated estimate from their recommended repairer for a couple of cracks in the rear bumper cover.
Cat S is when there's any damage to the frame... the red car, maybe it was assumed there was intrusion into the base of the A pillar or inner arch and again, maybe at that age it's better to err on the side of caution.
BMW could supply a bumper cover for my car for just under £650 in primer, but the repairer suggested by the other insurer padded their estimate up to over £2K with blending paint in on the rear wings and bootlid, etc.
The red one does look worse but had no structural damage so should have been Cat N but my nephew couldn't afford to argue about that as he needed the payout to fund the repairs. Just wondering, but do any insurers actually send anyone qualified to look at damaged cars any more?
Anyway getting back to the original topic, based on my experiences over the years I wouldn't dismiss Cat cars out of hand. It all depends on when they got the Cat marker in their life and the extent and type of damage - photos help no end too.
You just need to be aware of how a Cat marker will always affect value.
Dingu said:
You would be crying at the additional cost if they did. Instead of crying relentlessly about your stbox being a cat N.
Nice to see you couldn't get two sentences right without an edit. tbox being a cat N. Edited by Dingu on Friday 6th September 08:39
I'm sure the OP will find your input really helpful.
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